I normally write a little note to the seniors I've had for 4 years. This year was a little different (that's an understatement), and I decided to extend it to some I hadn't seen in a year or two. I wrote it before the protests started occurring all over the country and world, but I think the point stands that though these graduating seniors are emerging into a world of immeasurable challenges, they have already shown and will continue to show unity and perseverance to overcome them. Congratulations, Class of 2020!
Dear senior,
I’m writing this to you because I’ve taught or coached you at some point. Maybe it’s been a while. It certainly has been a long time since I’ve seen any student face to face. I’m sure you’ve felt at least some of the five stages of grief. The denial that the pandemic was even something to be worried about, the anger at being cooped up in your house without an opportunity to see your friends, the bargaining with your parents about trying to find loopholes and ways to get out, the depression and gravitas of such a life-altering event. Maybe you’ve reached acceptance, maybe not. What seemed a surreal joke March 12th is certainly a different reality 2+ months on.
I’m also fairly sure you’ve heard the various celebrities, officials, higher ups, parents, teachers, and others sympathizing with you about all of the fun things that were abruptly snatched from you. No talent show singing, Prom dancing, sports playing, awards receiving, senior week romping, graduation commencing, summer trysting, at least as they used to be. You may be thinking of those missed opportunities as you sit at home for what seems like the 3,482nd day in a row.
I can add my voice to that sympathetic chorus (and I am sorry this happened to you), but to be honest, though my high school experience ended almost 20 years ago (or did it? I’m still here…), I wanted to offer an additional perspective. I don’t remember much about my Prom, other than that I was coerced to go on a blind date with a foreign exchange student who spoke little English. I don’t remember much about my senior week or my graduation day or what I did my last summer before college.
What stuck with me were not the details of what I did or where I did it, but how I felt. The relationships I’d made over years and years with my classmates, my teachers, my friends. The sense of accomplishment, the hope and joy of a new beginning, the wonder and excitement (and a bit of fear) of the unexplored. Though this pandemic may feel like it is stripping you of your teenagehood, and though it surely creates some temporary disappointment, it cannot take those feelings from you.
Like every generation before you that has faced world-shattering adversity, from Pearl Harbor to the Kennedy assassination to the Vietnam War to 9/11 (and so, so many more), you and your peers will have this event to cement you together forever. It is one of the great ironies of life that the harder the situation, the more likely it is to unite people in a moment of shared understanding. And humans always rise above, in the end.
I know that you, too, will rise above and turn malaise into music, anxiety into art, COVID into creativity. You will do great things in life. I wish you the best of all possible futures. As the famous philosopher Søren Kierkegaard said,
“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”
Sincerely,
Mr. Revkin
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